Table of Content

15 January 2018, Volume 34 Issue 1

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Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia is Associated with Emotional Reactivity, Emotion Regulation and Impulsivity in Preschooler

ZHANG Runzhu, ZHAO Yimeng, QIN Rongcai, WANG Zhenhong

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  1-9.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.01

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Polyvagal theory and previous researches both provided clues to the close relationship between vagal tone, vagal regulation and emotional reactivity and regulation of children. But as yet, there is no direct evidence that the vagal tone, vagal regulation related to children's emotional activity and regulation. By neurophysiological measurement and children's parent reporting questionnaire method, this study investigated the baseline cardiac vagal tone, indexed by baseline respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), vagal suppression during stress task, indexed by RSA withdrawal, and vagal recovery after stress task, indexed by RSA recovery in relation to emotional reactivity, emotion regulation and trait impulsivity in 93 children aged 4-6. Results indicated that (1) baseline RSA was significantly negatively correlated with children's emotional reactivity but positively correlated with children's ability of emotion regulation. Baseline RSA was a significant negative predictor to emotional reactivity and a positive expectation for emotion regulation. (2) RSA withdrawal and RSA recovery both significantly negatively correlated with level of children's impulsivity and also a significant negative predictive factor to impulsiveness. This study provided some evidences to the hypothesis proposed by polyvagal theory that both cardiac vagal tone and its regulation are physiological basis of children's emotion activity and regulation.

The Effects of Paternal-and Maternal-attachment on Children's Cortisol Reactivity to Stress

WANG Xiaolei, CHEN Lihua, BU Yu, LIN Danhua

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  10-20.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.02

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To test the associations between paternal-and maternal-attachment and children's cortisol reactivity to stress, a sample of 115 healthy children (ages 9.25~13.67) was recruited from an elementary school in Beijing, China. The present study performed the Trier Social Stress Test for Children (TSST-C) protocol, which is the most widely used psychosocial stress protocol in laboratory studies of human subjects. Children were asked to complete a videotaped 5-min public speaking task and a 5-min mental arithmetic task in front of two evaluative and non-responsive audience members. Six salivary samples were collected throughout the session:baseline (-20min), after preparation (-3min), after TSST-C task (+1min), first recovery (+10min), second recovery (+25min) and third recovery (+50min). Parental-attachment was assessed via self-report by using the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA). Results showed that:(1) In comparison with children who reported secure paternal-attachment, children who reported insecure paternal-attachment displayed blunted cortisol responses to stress, as indexed by the lower cortisol levels across time and smaller area under the curve with respect to increase (AUC_I). (2) Maternal-attachment was not associated with cortisol levels across time or AUC_I. (3) Regression analyses indicated that after controlling for age, gender, BMI, subject social status, pubertal status, and monthly income, higher levels of paternal-attachment predicted larger AUC_I. These findings suggested that secure paternal-attachment was associated with children's higher cortisol responses to stress.

The Effects of Parents' Homo Economicus Belief on Themselves' Trust and Adolescents' Trust

LIU Guofang

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  21-27.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.03

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Homo economicus belief is the basic humanity hypothesis of economics, which assumes that human beings are rational decision makers who have the motivation to maximize their own self-interest. Previous literature revealed that homo economicus belief would inhibit trust. Those studies first activated college students' homo economicus belief by concept activation methods and mindset activation methods. It was found that participants' trust was inhibited by the activated belief. However, those studies cannot affirm that it was the homo economicus belief was activated in their priming tasks. Moreover, the college students in their studies had little economic experiences which may impede the potential validity of the results. Therefore, the effect of homo economicus belief on trust should be confirmed further. Finally, several studies had revealed that parents' trust can transmit to their children and individuals' selfish behaviors could inhibit observers' trust. Therefore, parents' homo economicus belief may inhibit children's trust. Based on a Chinese sample of 351 parents-child pairs, this study aimed to examine whether parents' homo economicus belief could affect their own trust and their children's trust. The study first developed a scale of homo economicus belief which contains two subscales:selfish and rational, and then collected parents' homo economicus belief, and then collected parents' and children's trust levels in investment game questionnaires. Each child was asked to decide how many chocolates would they like to send to a strange child and to guess how many chocolates would the strange child return to them. Each parent was asked to decide how much money would they like to send to a stranger and to guess how much money would the stranger return to them. Both the amounts of money and chocolates that participants sending and estimating to be returned was used to measure the level of interpersonal trust. The results showed that (1) the scale of homo economicus belief had good reliability and validity. (2) Both the parents and the children exhibited trust to some extent in the investment game questionnaires. (3) There was no significant gender difference between parents' homo economicus belief, parents' trust, and children's trust. (4) Parents' homo economicus belief can negatively predict their trust levels:the investment money and the estimated returning money. (5) Gender of the child moderated the effect of parents' homo economicus belief on children's trust. Parents' homo economicus belief can predict sons' trust (i.e., the investment chocolates), whereas they did not for daughters. This study confirms the previous literature and improves the understanding of the effect of homo economicus belief on trust.

The Joint Effects of Paternal and Maternal Psychological Control and Children Temperament on Children Problem Behaviors: Diathesis Stress or Differential Susceptibility

GAO Xin, DING Bilei, FENG Shuhui, XING Shufen

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  28-37.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.04

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This study examined the joint effects of paternal and maternal psychological control and children's negative emotionality on children problem behavior in the perspective of Temperament×Environment interaction among 226 preschool children and their parents. Data were collected from parents' reports. The hierarchical regression analyses and Analysis of Regions of Significance (RoS) were employed to examine the joint effects. Results indicated that:when predicting externalizing problems, the main effects of paternal and maternal psychological control and the interaction of paternal psychological control and children' negative emotionality were significant. The analysis of RoS showed that children with high negative emotionality suffered more from high paternal psychological control and benefited more from low paternal psychological control, which supported the differential susceptibility model. When predicting the internalizing problems, neither the main effects of paternal and maternal psychological control nor the interactions of children negative emotionality and paternal or maternal psychological control were significant. Those results suggested that the effect of parental psychological control on internalizing problems was relative moderate in early childhood.

Effects of Peer status on Different Types of Aggression in Early Adolescence: Moderating Effects of Gender and Class Aggression Norms

ZHANG Yunyun, NIU Lili, REN Ping, QIN Xingna

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  38-48.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.05

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Using peer nomination procedure, a longitudinal study of 2470 students in grade eight was carried out to investigate the impact of prior aggression, social preference, social dominance on physical, verbal and relational aggression, and whether these effects would be moderated by gender and corresponding classroom norms. Multilevel linear analysis found that:(1) Social preference negatively predicted adolescents' aggression half a year later, while social dominance positively predicted it, and the effect of social preference on relational aggression was stronger for boys. (2) The moderating effects of class norms were different for boys and girls. For boys, higher levels of class norms on physical and verbal aggression, but not relational aggression, were associated with increases in subsequent aggressive behavior. For girls, with the increase of class norm on physical aggression, all of their physical aggression went up; but with the increase of class norm on verbal or relational aggression, their verbal or relational aggressive behavior rose only for girls whose initial level of aggression were low. (3) Social dominance positively predicted verbal aggression over time, especially in the classrooms with higher level of class norm.

Effect of Justification of Video Game Violence on Aggression: A Mediated Moderation Model

HENG Shupeng, ZHOU Zongkui, SUN Lijun, LI Junyi

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  49-57.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.06

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The present study tested whether individuals would show less aggression and more guilt when virtual violence was unjustified and players were inexperienced, and whether guilt mediated the association between justification of violence and aggression.The experiment employed a 2 (justified/unjustified violence)×2 (experienced/inexperienced players) between-subjects design. Participants (n=62) were dichotomized into inexperienced (n=32) and experienced (n=30) players, and randomly assigned to play either a justified violent game (n=31) or an unjustified violent game (n=31). Game play lasted for approximately 20 minutes. After game play, guilt was tested through self-report method, and aggression was measured by the amount of hot sauce which the participant gave to an ostensible partner who hated spicy food. Results of ANOVAs showed that there were main effects for justification of violence and for video game experience on both guilt and aggression, and there was also a significant interaction between justification and experience for both dependent variables.The results also revealed a mediated moderation.Video game experience moderated the effect of justification of violence on aggression, and the moderating effect of game experience was mediated by guilt.

The Effects of Psychological Capital on College Students' Career Decision-Making Difficulties: Moderated Mediating Effect

YE Baojuan, LEI Xi, FANG Xiaoting, FU Haohao, YOU Yayuan, CHEN Jiawen

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  58-64.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.07

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The present study constructed a moderated mediation model to examine whether self-control ability mediated the relation between psychological capital and career decision-making difficulties, and whether this mediating process was moderated by social skill. 730 college students (339 boys and 391 girls, M-age=21.08, SD-age=3.27) were recruited in the study to complete psychological capital questionnaire, decision-making self-efficacy questionnaire, social skill questionnaire and the decision-making self-efficacy questionnaire.The results indicated that:(1) Decision-making self-efficacy played a partial mediating role between psychological capital and college students' career decision-making difficulties. (2) Social skill moderated the first half path and the latter half path of the mediation effect. The research conclusion had important theoretical and practical value for promoting the employment of college students.

Study on the Emergence and Development of Orthographic Awareness in Chinese Preschool Children

LIU Yufei, QIAN Yi, SONG Yaowu, BI Hongyan

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  65-72.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.08

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Studies have shown that the orthographic awareness plays an important role in the development of children's literacy. There are three levels in the orthographic system of Chinese characters:strokes, radicals and the whole characters. About the whole characters, a number of literatures reveal that pre-school children could tell the difference between the Chinese characters and those obviously different materials such as numbers, letters, scribbles and so on. The present study aims to investigate the awareness of the characters-specific of Chinese. We analyzed the performance of pre-school children when asked to distinguish Chinese characters from Korean, Japanese (hiragana) and Chinese characters, which are similar in shape. In terms of the radicals, some people think that pre-school children haven't developed the position awareness of radicals. Conversely, some people believe that pre-school children could realize the reasonable position of the radicals. We optimized the experimental design to make clear that whether it has been developed or not. Two studies were designed to investigate the orthographic awareness in Chinese preschool children. We recruited 102 preschool children, who fell into three age groups:4-year-olds, 5-year-olds and 6-year-olds, consisting of 31, 37 and 34 children respectively. Chinese characters, Korean and Japanese characters were used to investigate the specific awareness of Chinese characters. And we used pictophonetic words of up-down and left-right structures to make pseudo-characters and non-characters to investigate the position awareness of the radicals. Children were asked to decide which one was Chinese character. Results showed that children could tell the Japanese was not Chinese characters and at about the age of 5 the ability reached maturity. Children at the age of four could not tell the difference between Chinese and Korean and even for the 6-year-old children, the ability wasn't mature. The results revealed that judging Japanese was easier than Korean and the specific awareness of Chinese characters didn't develop very well at the preschool age. All groups of children could realize that the pseudo-characters conform to the rules of orthography while the ability of judging the non-characters didn't evolve in preschool. They couldn't tell the correct position of the radicals and meanwhile we found that six years old children were more likely to discriminate the non-characters of up-down structures.

Developmental Trends of Literacy Skills of Chinese Lower Graders: The Predicting Effects of Reading-related Cognitive Skills

HUI Yi, ZHOU Xuelian, LI Yixun, DE Xiuqi, LI Hong, LIU Xiangping

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  73-79.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.09

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Objective:The present study aimed to examine the developmental trends of literacy skills, including character recognition, vocabulary and time-limited reading comprehension, of Chinese lower grades students in primary school, and the predicting effects of reading-related cognitive skills (morpheme awareness, orthographic awareness and rapid naming skill). Method:177 first-grade students in Beijing were followed from the beginning of grade one to grade two. Reading-related cognitive skills were measured once at the beginning and literacy skills were assessed three times across one year. Hierarchical Linear Modeling was adopted to explore the trends of literacy skills. Results and conclusions:The results showed that (a) similar significant growing trends were observed in character recognition, vocabulary and time-limited reading comprehension task among students. But the change of individual difference within each literacy skill was different. The individual difference of character recognition showed a decreasing trend, vocabulary knowledge remained stable and individual difference increased in time-limited reading comprehension task; (b) More analysis indicated that the morpheme awareness, orthographic awareness and rapid naming skill positively predicted the initial performance on character recognition and time-limited reading comprehension, while morpheme awareness not only positively predicted the initial performance on vocabulary knowledge but also the developmental speed of time-limited reading comprehension.

Investigation on Mental Health State of Adolescents after 8.5 Years of Wenchuan Earthquake

WU Xinchun, WANG Wenchao, ZHOU Xiao, CHEN Qiuyan, LIN Chongde

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  80-89.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.10

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In eight and a half years after Wenchuan earthquake, a survey on posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, posttraumatic growth (PTG) and life satisfaction was conducted on junior school and high school students in the severely-stricken areas by the earthquake. The results showed that the level of adolescents' PTSD and depression were comparatively high, the prevalence of PTSD and depressive symptoms was 4.75% and 29.98%, among which girls, minority nationality and senior students were high risk populations. About 46.13% of adolescents had pronounced growth, girls and minority adolescents had higher levels of PTG. There had significant difference in grade of life satisfaction; students in first grade of junior school had higher levels of life satisfaction than other grades. PTSD was positively associated with depression and negatively associated with life satisfaction. Depression was negatively associated with PTG and life satisfaction. PTG was positively associated with life satisfaction. There is no significant correlation between PTSD and PTG. Latent profile analysis showed that a 5-class fitted the data best. The 5 pattern groups were named as ‘growth group’(32.6%), ‘coexistence group’(5.8%), ‘low symptoms group’(39.4%), ‘middle symptoms group’(17.8%) and ‘high symptoms group’(4.4%) respectively.

The Relation between Repetitive Trauma Exposure and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Understanding the Roles of Feelings of Safety and Cognitive Reappraisal

ZHOU Xiao, WU Xinchun, WANG Wenchao, TIAN Yuxin

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  90-97.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.11

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To examine the relation among repetitive trauma exposure, feelings of safety, cognitive reappraisal, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), this study investigates 1156 adolescents at 8.5 year after Wenchuan earthquake by using traumatic exposure questionnaire, life events inventory, feelings of safety questionnaire, emotion regulation strategies questionnaire, and modified DSM-5 PTSD checklist. The structural equation model was used to examine the relation above, and results found that repetitive trauma exposure has direct and positive effect on PTSD, and it also can exert indirect and positive effect on PTSD via feelings of interpersonal safety and sense of mastery, respectively. In addition, repetitive trauma exposure may also affect positively PTSD by feelings of interpersonal safety to cognitive reappraisal. However, repetitive trauma exposure has non-significant effect on PTSD by cognitive reappraisal, or by sense of mastery to cognitive reappraisal.

The Relationship between Social Support, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Posttraumatic Growth among Adolescents after Wenchuan Earthquake: Understanding the Role of Self-efficacy

AN Yuanyuan, YUAN Guangzhe, WU Xinchun, WANG Wenchao

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  98-104.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.12

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To examine the relationship among adopting traumatic exposure questionnaire, social support, self-efficacy, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and posttraumatic growth (PTG), this study investigates 1185 adolescents at 8.5 years after Wenchuan earthquake by using social support scale, the self-efficacy scale, the modified DSM-5 PTSD checklist and posttraumatic growth inventory. The structural equation model was used to examine the relationship, wherein the traumatic exposure would be controlled because its importance. The results found that after controlling for traumatic exposure, social support has direct and negative effect on PTSD, and it can also exert indirect and negative effect on PTSD via self-efficacy. In addition, social support has direct and positive effect on PTG, and it may also positively affect PTG via self-efficacy.

The Relation between Attachment and PTSD/PTG among Adolescents after the Wenchuan Earthquake: The Mediating Roles of Cognitive Reappraisal and Expressive Suppression

TIAN Yuxin, WU Xinchun, WANG Wenchao, ZHOU Xiao

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  105-111.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.13

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To examine the relation among attachment, cognitive reappraisal, expressive suppression, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and posttraumatic growth(PTG), the current study investigates 1153 adolescents at 8.5 years after Wenchuan earthquake by using traumatic exposure questionnaire, parent and peer attachment questionnaire, emotion regulation questionnaire, modified DSM-5 PTSD checklist, and posttraumatic growth inventory. Using structural equation model to examine the relation, and results revealed that attachment has direct and negative effect on PTSD, and has direct and positive effect on PTG; attachment has an indirect and negative effect on PTSD by cognitive reappraisal, and also has an indirect and positive effect on PTG by cognitive reappraisal; attachment can exert indirect and negative effect on PTSD via expressive suppression, but has non-significant effect on PTG via expressive suppression.

Mediating Roles of Meaning in Life in the Relationship between Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Posttraumatic Growth and Prosocial Behavior among Adolescents after the Wenchuan Earthquake

WANG Wenchao, WU Xinchun, TIAN Yuxin, ZHOU Xiao

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  112-119.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.14

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To examine the mediating roles of meaning in life in the relationship between posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), posttraumatic growth (PTG) and prosocial behavior, 1082 adolescents were assessed by adopting traumatic exposure questionnaire, the revised child PTSD symptom scale, posttraumatic growth inventory, meaning in life questionnaire and prosocial behavior questionnaire at eight and a half years after Wenchuan earthquake. The mediating roles would be assessed by using structural equation model, wherein the traumatic exposure would be controlled because its importance. The results found that after controlled traumatic exposure,both the presence of meaning and search for meaning mediated partly the relationship between PTSD, PTG and prosocial behavior. On the one hand, PTSD has a directly and negative effect on prosocial behavior and PTG has a directly and positive effect on prosocial behavior. On the other hand, PTSD could affect prosocial behavior negatively through presence of meaning while had a positive effect on prosocial behavior through search for meaning. Additionally, PTG has indirect and positive effect on prosocial behavior by presence of meaning and search for meaning.

Connectedness to Nature: Conceptualization, Measurements and Promotion

LI Yiming, LI Jian, WU Fanghui

Psychological Development and Education. 2018, 34(1):  120-127.  doi:10.16187/j.cnki.issn1001-4918.2018.01.15

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Connectedness to nature refers to the extent to which individuals identify themselves as a part of nature and are emotionally connected to nature. It reflects the quality of relationships between human and nature. Extant studies showed that connectedness to nature is significantly associated with individuals' physical and mental health, cognitive development, and their environmental awareness, and could be built or strengthened through cognitive learning and emotional experiences. Future research should verify the conceptualization and structure of connectedness to nature, and further explore the psychological mechanisms behind its development. Moreover, theoretical research could be combined with educational practice so that more longitudinal and intervention studies could be conducted. Lastly, researchers could consider to study connectedness to nature in other areas of psychological research.